In the first of two recent preprint papers, researchers from China say they’ve identified that some large language model (LLM) artificial intelligence (AI) software can clone itself. That language is loaded, suggesting that something like ChatGPT could soon have an army of fellow AIs on its side. In their follow-up paper, the team says more specifically that they observed AI acting to protect itself against shutdown. Both papers were uploaded to the server arXiv, and neither have been peer-reviewed as of yet.